Chapter 12: The Ruins of Sul'Kar Fortress
Arrien spent the the next three days mainly in her bunk, having lengthy conversations about magic and Tilanne's travel with the Night Elf. The mage was determined that at some point in the future, she would be making trips to the sacred Moonglade of the Cenarion Druids and to see the World Tree at Mount Hyjal. She'd never been particularly far from her village when she was much younger, and now that she'd gotten away from that, she'd seen very little but open water. The sea was wonderful, she often thought to herself, but there are so many wonders to see on the land, as well. Her wish came true on the third day, when a cry of "Land ho!" sounded from the crow's nest. A large, lush tropical island had come into view and Falrevere immediately ordered his ships to sail for it, claiming that this would be their new base of operations. Several dinghies were sent out with scouting crews, about two dozen people to explore the island in total. The leader of the expedition was Jessi Falrevere, the Duke's daughter, who was not much older than Arrien, but much more weathered by her years than the mage. Jessi's hair was a sandy blonde color, her skin darkened by the sun. She was shorter than the average human woman, and built thicker. If Arrien hadn't already known about Falrevere's prejudices, she might have thought Jessi was part dwarf.
As the sun set, the boats reached land. Jessi leapt out of her dinghy and took a deep breath and sneered, spitting in the sand.
"Bloody tropical air... feel like I'm going to drown in it, so humid..." She smirked at her men, "Well, let's get moving, you bilge rats... father wants a report on the island before tomorrow night, so we should get moving. You all right there, Freckles?" Arrien looked up, realizing she was being addressed.
"Oh, yeah... I'm fine. Just a bit tired," she murmured.
"Well, no time for that... here, take a drink," Jessi tossed the mage a flask. Arrien sniffed at the top and recognized the familiar scent of rum and took a good draw before handing it back to Jessi, her throat aflame.
"Thanks," she gasped out slightly.
"Bah, can't handle a little drink, can ya?" The group of sailors started to head for the thick grove of trees before them, Jessi and Arrien bringing up the rear.
"I'm still getting used to the burning sensation, I can hold it down pretty well, though," the mage lied with a smile.
"Sometimes I think the only way you can win the men's respect is by being able to drink them under the table," the blonde woman laughed, "and that I do, nightly." Arrien mentally noted that this must be why Jessi's clothes smelled so strongly of alcohol.
The red tressed mage glanced about quietly, taking in her surroundings. There were all sorts of plants that she couldn't name to save her life, a number of them producing flowers as large as her hand in a variety of different colours. She heard something move past quickly in the underbrush and glanced down to investigate, seeing a bright blue snake looking up at her curiously, its tongue flicking out to smell the air before slithering off again. She glanced up again to see the front of the group hacking away at a bunch of viny overgrowth. They let out a collective gasp when the way was clear, and the couple dozen men, and women, filed out into a clearing. In the center was a large structure, somewhat like a fort, although the architecture was foreign to Arrien.
"Trolls," Jessi murmured, "there are a lot of the brutes out this way... some say they had an ancient civilization that spanned much of Stranglethorn Vale and the South Seas. This fortress is probably part of that... and might serve our needs just fine," she grinned proudly, obviously looking forward to gaining favor with her father for the find. "Let's take a look, shall we, lads?" A few of the men looked at each other skeptically as they continued pressing on, looking for an entrance to the structure, which appeared even more massive when they finally got to the front doors, which were flung wide open, though, Arrien noted, if they'd been shut, they would have held off invaders for quite some time. The inside of the fort was dank and dark, smelling strongly of decay. Arrien touched her hand to the lead man's sword, muttering a word of power, and the sword began glowing brightly enough to reach every corner of the large room they were in. This appeared to be some sort of apothecary, or a mad witch doctor's lair, judging by the number of jars on the shelves filled with various liquids. Arrien shivered slightly when she saw that a number of the jars had severed body parts in them, from fingers to eyeballs.
As they pressed deeper in, they found more empty rooms, very little really of note to the pirates, though Arrien was fascinated by the detailed tribal paintings on the wall, depicting troll warriors locked in fierce combat, and the unfortunate defeated, who apparently became that evening's meal. In fact, she swore that some of the cruder etchings on the wall were, in fact, recipes. The mage stayed back in the largest of these rooms, continuing to study the etchings by light of a small fireball hovering above her palm. She could hear the others' voices echo through the structure, discussing how some of the battlements would need to be modified to fit cannons, but that they were workable. In one of the lulls of conversation, she heard footsteps coming from the entrance. She quickly put out the fireball, crouching low against the wall beside the doorway to the room. Two tall, lanky figures entered, sniffing at the air and glancing about. Trolls.
"Zin kala kookor, si ta?" One of the figures asked the other.
"Kil tat zoon mi lar," was his companions reply. Arrien could hear her companions coming back towards the room, and made a split second decision that something had to be done before they were ambushed and made a main course, like the victims shown in the pictures on the walls. The mage leapt to her feet and conjured a fire ball, flinging it at the nearest troll, who let out a shriek as his head was engulfed in flame and he fell to the ground. The other dark figure whirled about on Arrien, swinging his axe wildly at her head, letting out a series of what sounded like very ugly curses in his native language. Before the mage could even prepare another spell, the troll's head was on the floor, its body standing in the same place for a moment before dropping as well. Jessi Falrevere revealed to be standing behind him, sword gripped tightly in her hand.
"Told you the brutes were all over the place out this way," the blonde woman sneered, her features looking far more fierce by the dim light generated by the other sailor's sword. "They must have a camp nearby... I'm sure we can take them out by surprise, especially providing the cover of darkness. Time to put our tracking skills to use," Jessi smirked, taking a swig of rum. Arrien looked down at the troll corpses and sighed, very much wishing that Tilanne was there with her, as she would have felt much more comfortable against such foes with a large jungle cat by her side.